Home
by sondering
Summary: Home is where the heart is. A wolfet one-shot.


"Well," Scarlet sighed. "This is it. This... this is home."

Wolf could hear the falter in her voice, it was unmistakable. After the chaos of the revolution and its backfires and rebounds, it would be harder to settle in the farmhouse life again. Needless to say, the swat of paparazzi and reporters flocking around them the moment they stepped foot in France was far more than stressing.

They would both struggle in finding newfound peace in Scarlet's farm. In _their_ farm.

Scarlet immediately kicked off her shoes at the door and waltzed to the kitchen, leaving Wolf to close the door behind him and follow her.

He stopped his tracks in the corridor, peeking at Scarlet sitting on one of the chairs and lifting her elbows onto the wooden table. He watched as she stared at the wall on the other side of the kitchen in a daze before she covered her face with her chubby hands, hiding the usual determination and fieriness in her eyes.

But this time around, walking into the farmhouse, Wolf saw something else.

He saw pain in his alpha's eyes.

At first he thought he was imagining things. Or maybe he was in-denial. He'd already been through hell and back and was trying to recover from the permanent changes both internally and externally. He couldn't handle it if he saw Scarlet was undergoing the same thing. He'd be crushed.

He was a fool for letting one sudden thought float in his head, although he was proud that it quickly vanished. For one second, he thought that life would immediately start being fairly happy and dandy to them. After everything they'd been through, after all the unfairness life curved and hurdled their way, maybe it'd give them the chance to start things out normally and happily - and fast.

But Wolf should've known better. And he did know better, he simply wanted to daydream impossible possibilities for a split second.

Wolf snapped out of his thoughts the minute he heard a slight whimper coming from none other than Scarlet herself.

Cautiously, he made his way toward her. He wasn't sure what to say or what to do. Should he apologize? For what? Was it something he did? What did he do? Should he wrap an arm around her? Yes, he would wrap an arm around her. He hoped she wouldn't shrivel at such contact. He knew Scarlet enough to know that she was not like the others, that she would never do something like that. But one could never be so sure. The size of his hand against hers was incredibly different, and it made him insecure just to think about it.

He patted a hand on her back before crouching down and trying to see her covered face. Slowly, Scarlet caught on that she was not alone, and Wolf watched as she quickly tried to wipe the tears falling from her cheeks.

He softly cupped her cheek before nuzzling against her neck. Words didn't mean anything right now. Only contact did. Contact always did. Just like how her words did not sway him at times when he went on his animal instincts, it was her touch and her scent that made him come back to her in Ze'ev form.

"I'm sorry."

"You don't have to apologize for anything."

Scarlet sniffled, flickering her eyes on him. "I'm a mess, aren't I?"

Tired she was, but a mess she was not. Her fiery red hair was disheveled into a messy bun, and her eyes startling revealed how broken down and tired she was. Although she was a courageous, brave, and strong-wiled woman, inside that woman was still a normal small-town eighteen-year-old girl.

Wolf shook his head, giving her a close-lipped smile. "You're anything but."

At this, Scarlet started to smile, which made Wolf unleash his smile and his hideous fangs. But he didn't care. If she didn't find them hideous then it didn't matter to him whether they really were or not.

"No, but really. I'm sorry for this random outburst and completely neglecting you and your feelings. But I'm just... a mixture of things. While I'm grateful and relieved - _so_ relieved that I'm back home, I've realized that home isn't the same anymore. It will never be the same. And it's not just because of the annoying press that always seem to find a way back on our footsteps and the publicity and even the trauma of the revolution...it's my grand-mėre."

At this, Wolf felt a slight pang in his chest. He felt guilty about her grand-mėre's death. After all, him and his pack did play a part in it. Although he wasn't the one to kill her, he was the one who lied to Scarlet about her grand-mėre's disappearance initially.

"She was always there. Before you. Before _this_ ," Scarlet gestured toward the window that had curtains over it. "Before the war. It was just me and her. No one else. And now that she's gone and it's finally _really_ hit me that she's gone, I can't help but feel so empty without her. This kitchen?" Scarlet started to smirk, recalling memories of her. "Still has the scent of her. It still smells of the food she used to cook. Out there?" Scarlet pointed to the corridor. "Outside was where she fed and made sure all her animals were all right. She made a garden of her own. And stars, was she good at it. She made sure that I was on top of chores after she was done hers. She taught me her ways. She gave me guidance when nobody else did. She gave me a weight of responsibilities just when it would come to this day where I'd be all alone in this farm. But I wasn't expecting that the day would be today." Scarlet shook her head, trying to fight the incoming tears away.

Just when Wolf thought about saying something to fill the void, he went against it and stayed quiet still. He wanted to make sure she got out everything that she needed to before he intruded her genuine thoughts and confessions. He was only there to listen.

"But now I have you, and you're one of the best things that's happened to me. The best thing that's happened to me in a while, to be quite honest. While I was never expecting to be in the middle of a revolution, it was never my intention to find love either. I thought I was going to be independent and hold my own on this farm alone like my grand-mėre did for some time, but it turned out I was wrong. I not only have you apart of my home, but you as my home. You, Ze'ev, are my home. And you don't know how much you mean to me that you are."

Ze'ev was dumfounded. Throughout the course of the revolution, he'd grown to stand beside and know Scarlet. Somehow, he'd gotten the luxury of stealing her trust, only to bring it right back to her after he'd betrayed her. But Ze'ev had found a way to grasp it right back again. Somewhere down the line, he'd been infamous for stealing her heart. Or maybe, just maybe, she gave it to him. Needless to say, Ze'ev didn't think for only a second that it was possible for him to have her heart. Ever since their first encounter at the tavern, she'd came across to him as a girl not to be messed with. A girl that was too occupied with her own duties to take on the weight of another's. A girl who was untouchable because she gave out the message that she was. They were both originally on a mission: for Scarlet, to find her grand-mėre, and for Ze'ev, to not get too attached to her. But he'd done just that, and through all their trials and tribulations, it brought them here. Together.

 _Home_.


End file.
